Page 24

Wonder

His silhouette puddles across the floor. Daytime starlight slashes through the window. Blue streaks give the room a compass effect, beams of lightness and darkness pointing like fingers.

She cannot tell whether her throat bobs from remorse, mortification, or a fragile emotion linked to the words in that letter.

If Wonder turns, will she see him differently? Will she see him ? That dearest human?

Delaying any further will make her look guilty.

She turns, her eyes dragging up his body framed in the doorway like a sculpture of the devil.

Malice idles on the threshold, his arms raised above his head, his hands gripping the casing.

This pushes him forward, angling the god into a deep incline, a precarious and slippery slope.

It also places his attributes on display, the ridges of his arms and the expanse of his torso lengthening, adding definition to an already expansive form.

Destiny has converted him from a dear mortal to a monster outfitted in black, a dark specimen graced with hair the color of innocence, those waves gilded as if he’s an angel.

When she meets his eyes, both incarnations stare back. Without pity, the visual cracks her heart like a shell.

It’s you. It’s really you.

But what happened? Why are you like this?

How I’ve missed you. How I despise myself for what I did to you. How I despise you for what you’re doing to me.

I hate you. I love you.

I will not forgive you. I’m sorry.

Wonder can look at him all day. And she cannot bear to look at him another second. It’s too much. She needs to get out of here before she dissolves and splashes to the floor.

This might explain why he treats her with rancor. Though, it doesn’t make sense. Malice may recall her letters to him, but he cannot know she’s the author. She was invisible back then; they never met in the flesh, much less in any guise.

They never spoke to each other. Not once.

He remembers her words. But he cannot know her face or voice.

Can he? If this god has somehow discovered she’s the ghost of his past, it’s undetectable. However, that’s Malice, seldom revealing what he wants, feels, thinks, or knows. There are exceptions to this rule, but not many.

Marshaling herself, Wonder gains her feet and matches his mask of indifference. She has grown accustomed to his unpredictable caprices. She has gleaned the signs of when he’ll attack or withdraw. Although that deceptive calm suggests the latter, she’s no fool. He’s livid.

Malice crooks a finger, silently beckoning her. If he wants Wonder to venture nearer, he’s got another thing coming.

Recognizing that unspoken challenge, he boosts himself from the doorframe and prowls toward her, stopping close enough to reveal the cinder flecks in his irises.

And because she folds both hands in front of her, the demon dips his head to examine the scars.

From the day they met in The Celestial City’s library, he’s been fixated on her wounds, while Wonder has refused to surrender a single tidbit of information.

Depriving Malice of the facts routinely drives him to the precipice, but it also gives his adversaries power.

To this day, Wonder chooses power. Regardless, his gaze skims her like a phantom touch.

“Pain clashes with your skin tone,” he observes in a razor-sharp timbre. “Who’s to blame for this?”

“I am,” she tells him, fighting to keep her voice neutral.

“Not what I mean, but okay.” Those eyes dice a path to hers. “Was it worth it?”

Every cut. Every bead of blood. Every heartbeat.

In many ways, the answer is simple. In others, not at all. Honestly, she doesn’t know what’s real and not real any more.

Her indecision stokes the flames reflected in Malice’s pupils. He’s about to either pursue this subject or address her latest infraction.

She doesn’t have to guess for long. Malice’s attention segues to the quiver, the arrows and letters crowded together, the sight locking his jaw. “Either you’re one hell of an overachiever or a nosy goddess.”

Defiance springs off her tongue. “They aren’t mutually exclusive.”

“Curious little cat. You’ve got The Archives at your disposal. Our home, away from home, away from home. What can my property give you that a million square feet of books can’t?”

“For a start, my corsage.”

“Sure. That’s a reasonable motive. But are you certain that’s all you were looking for? Seems you followed the scent of paper instead. Couldn’t help yourself but to help yourself, is that it?”

“You arrived too soon. I had no chance to help myself.”

Denial sounds guiltier. With Malice, it’s better to subvert his expectations by owning up.

Playing along, Malice stalks past her. Wheeling slowly, she watches him squat and pick through the quiver. He must have the letters organized in a way only he can identify, in case someone with curves decides to snoop.

Wonder steels herself. She had made sure to place the envelope in its original spot. But if he grins, that means he’s going to pounce.

Unarmed, she flits her eyes over the arrows, then to the wooden longbow propped against the wall. Then at last, he stands. His shoulders relax, along with that conniving mouth.

Good. She won’t have to use his archery against him.

“Satisfied?” she asks.

While considering her, Malice runs the plank of his thumb across his lower lip. “Oh, I will be. Rest assured.”

“Rest? I’m not the one who has trouble resting.”

That’s pushing it. The reference to nightmares causes his features to spasm in surprise, right before he fishes a petal from his pocket.

Umbrage flares her nostrils. Wonder recognizes this token from her corsage, which he must have carried around for a moment such as this. She lunges, swiping out her arm.

With serpentine speed, Malice reels back, holding the blossom out of reach. Twirling the stem in his fingers, he says, “And I’m not the one who has trouble doing this.” Making a fist, he crushes the petal.

“No!” Rage pouring through her veins, Wonder claws at his arms, wrestling with him until he exposes the bloom. Still intact.

She goes still, remembering herself. For a second, Wonder had forgotten how robust flora is in The Dark Fates. It takes more than a god’s closed fist to wilt the nature of this land.

Malice had counted on that, counted her Wonder taking leave of her senses. At her wit’s end, she seizes the blossom, clenching it in her grip. Knocking into his shoulder, she storms past him.

“Wildflower?”

She pauses at the doorway. While she glowers into the dormitory hall, his words lick up her back, that voice wrapping around Wonder like a snare. “Peek in here again, and I’ll burn those fucking flowers.”

She twists halfway. “Burn them, and I’ll shred the letters while you rest .”

The rebuttal incites a protective glare from him. One that warns her against the endeavor, yet dares her to try anyway.

Wonder charges from the room, their mutual threats lingering like a rancid aftertaste for the rest of the day, well into the afternoon as she resumes her perch in The Hollow Chamber.

Hunching in her favorite chair, she stamps both elbows onto the table, drops her face into her palms, and schools herself to breathe.

Truly, she deserves an award for that performance. To convince Malice she hadn’t taken anything from his quiver is a fleeting triumph. But restraining herself from either cupping his jaw or punching a crater into his face has a place in the history books.

The library goddess with intractable willpower. It would make a commendable tale.

Speaking of texts, Wonder glimpses her surroundings, then plucks the letter from her bodice. The swift motion causes the paper to slip from her grasp and land atop the open book she’d been reading. It’s an anthology about The Dark Fates’ natural resources, the biology of its environment.

Except she can’t right now. She just can’t bother perusing pages that reveal next to nothing.

Wonder moves to pluck the letter and then close the book. Except something stops her. Clasping the hardback rim, her eyes hook onto the layers of paper overlapping paper.

The sepia sheet resting above the volume’s text has become transparent.

She straightens, flattening the leaflet, pressing it firmly against the manuscript.

What was a yellowing sheet one second ago now turns into a translucent surface.

It blots out the anthology’s original text, enabling alternative script to materialize as if the sepia paper is a magnet, drawing hidden cursive to the surface.

Pulse quickening, Wonder scoots closer. It’s not that Malice’s letter has its own sort of magic, given his handwriting remains visible, interfering with this new secret message.

As such, she tilts the letter so only the blank areas cover the manuscript, so that it doesn’t obscure the mystery beneath.

Her gaze jumps across the words. As it does, her scalp tingles with a familiar thrill, fraught with risk and reward. She has experienced this pivotal sensation twice before, walking a fine line between ignorance and discovery. Now she feels it for a third time.

It’s a legend.

She reads fast. In Love and Andrew’s story, the secret quest had involved uniting hearts. In Anger and Merry’s story, it involved kindling and breaking hearts. As for this new legend, Wonder’s finger glides across the paper.

If a deity releases their own heart, that deity will heal from their greatest mistake.

Her head snaps up. Only one regret festers within her. Only one person. So if she releases her heart from the past, Wonder shall recover from it. She’ll free herself of the guilt and pain. In turn, that will make her stronger, empowering her for the battle ahead.

The ache for Malice’s ghost will vanish. She’ll stop hurting, stop loving who he used to be, stop wanting him to change back. In the end, he will mean nothing to her.

And there’s more. Sometimes secrets have multiple clauses. Any qualified research diva wouldn’t merely take a legend at face value.

Wonder attempts different techniques, which include folding the overlapping paper in numerous variations, then twisting it like a door knob, moving clockwise and counterclockwise.

But when those procedures fail to unearth new information, she presses down harder and steers the leaflet across the surface, highlighting and obscuring parts like a magnifying glass.

She treats the page like a map, sweeping the sepia sheet across its typography, bearing northward and then southward.

Still nothing. Yet there must be a chink.

So begins a diligent investigation of the manuscript. Wonder flips from chapter to chapter, repeating the process, gliding the sepia sheet across the calligraphy. This, with the help of a yellowed and brittle letter belonging to her rival.

But enough about the demon. This is about two pieces of paper reacting to one another. Perhaps this legend is only able to reveal itself when paper from the human realm makes contact with immortal paper.

Wonder reaches the final section of the book when it happens. Trying one last method, she lifts the sepia paper and then releases it, letting it flutter atop the manuscript like a quill plume. For that’s what had accidentally happened hours earlier.

Has it really been hours? Yes, it has. This tome is large and heavy, containing a breeding ground of text. Therefore, it has taken a while to investigate.

Wonder watches as the paper drapes itself over the anthology, as delicately as a feather. At that instant, text surfaces like debris from the bottom of an ocean, except these sentences shine like tinsel. It’s the handwriting of The Stars, emancipated after who knows how long.

Her kind has many assumptions, including the falsehood that gods and goddesses are incapable of feeling love.

Yet deities indeed possess hearts, and those hearts beat, learn, and grow.

In fact, that’s how immortal kinships and friendships begin.

This begets brotherhoods and sisterhoods, if not families.

Therefore, the legend says that while a deity might release their own heart, they might also recover that heart. Wonder mouths the words, fixing them in her mind. To recover one’s own heart can mean a thousand things.

If a deity releases her heart…

If a deity recovers his heart…

This has no bearing on her mission. Yet it’s important to those involved.

The first part is relevant to her. To release her heart, perhaps she must endure a specific test, resist a specific temptation, or reject a specific moment. Maybe she needs to utter particular words or perform a distinct action.

In any event, she’ll be ready. Wonder has endured a lifetime of heartbreak. Yet here she is, still a library goddess, still damned intelligent.

She can do this. She must do this.

The second part may very well pertain to Malice. To recover that black, pounding organ in his chest, what task must he face?

The legend spills across the pages, a proclamation bleeding to the edge of the manuscript.

If a deity recovers their heart, all that came before shall be restored.

But what facet of before ? What shall be restored?

“His memory,” she whispers, her mouth as dry as a straw.

If Malice succeeds, he’ll get his memory back just as Love and Andrew have. The demon god shall relive all his blessings. And his torments. He will reconnect with every recollection, the happiness as well as the source of his nightmares.

Bleakness and hope clash in Wonder’s psyche. She didn’t discover this by accident. And if so, Malice deserves to know. If he doesn’t remember who he is, he’ll want this opportunity.

But whether the outcome will strengthen or destroy him is another matter. And whether she’ll gain something vital or lose something valuable by releasing her heart is yet to be determined.